Crochet cupcake potholders would be a delightful craft project for anyone who enjoys cooking, baking or owning cute kitchen accessories.

I crocheted my sample potholder using a popular combination of Christmas colors — red, green and white. I think this design is appealing for Christmas gift giving. It is also ideal for keeping and using in your own kitchen during the holiday season, especially if you enjoy baking and having fresh home-baked goodies at Christmas time.

If you crochet these potholders in other colors, they could work well for other holidays. For example, if you work the background in black, the cupcake frosting in orange, and the cherry in red-orange, you’d have potholders that are great for Halloween. Work the potholders in shades of pink and red and they’re perfect for Valentine’s Day, or shades of green for St. Patrick’s Day. Lots of other color combinations would work well for everyday use.

Crochet Skill Level:

Materials:

Yarn:

You’ll need 4 different colors of yarn:

Color A: The main color, used in the background. In the potholder you see pictured above, this is the off white / cream color.

Color B: The cake color. In my sample potholder, this is the brown color.

Color C: The frosting color on the cupcake. In my sample potholder, this is the green color.

Color D: The border color, which is also used for the cherry. You could make these two different colors if you prefer, in which case, there would be five colors all together.

Ideally, you will want to use the same weight of yarn for all 4-5 colors. It isn’t a strict requirement, but it’s easier to keep an even tension if your yarn weights are all similar.

In my sample potholder, all of the above colors are feltable worsted weight or light worsted weight wool yarn.

If you don’t want to use wool yarn, I suggest substituting cotton yarn instead. I don’t recommend using acrylic yarns because it can emit toxic vapors and / or melt if it gets hot — and a potholder is certainly going to be subjected to situations where it will get hot.

Finished Size:

My sample potholder is big, measuring approximately 9 inches wide by about 8.5 inches high. I had planned to felt my potholders, and I had thought the felting process could likely be expected to shrink them. I wanted to be sure to start out with enough material in the potholders that they would still be a decent size even if the shrinkage turned out to be substantial.

As of this posting, I haven’t felted the potholders yet, and I might not bother with it. I ended up liking my potholders quite a bit as they are, so I may just skip the felting and use them as is. They are likely to get felted soon enough from frequent washings anyway.

sc in 2nd ch from hook to start off. Do not crochet the red Xes on the chart; ignore them for now. The Xes denote areas that will be cross stitched, and the cross stitch will be worked overtop of the cupcake pattern after you are finished crocheting the square.

Work the Edging:

When you have finished working the chart, change colors to color D. Work a round of sc st around the outer perimeter of the square using color D. Put 2 ch sts in ea corner.

In the top left corner, work loose ch sts to form a loop for hanging up the potholder. I worked a total of 12 chs, but you can chain the required number of sts to get the hanging loop size that would best suit your needs.

Then work an additional round of sl st around the outer edge and end off.

For a bit of extra color and dimension, you can work a round of surface crochet slip stitches in the spot where the border touches the outer edge of the charted design. On my sample potholder I worked these sl sts in green yarn. I think this makes a gorgeous finishing touch for the edging, and it ties the colors together beautifully.

Weave in loose ends.

Stitch the Cherry Motif:

Thread your tapestry needle using color D. Use it to cross stitch the cherry onto the top of the cupcake. Each red X on the chart represents a cross stitch on the finished piece.

Finishing the Cupcake Design:

Insert your crochet hook into a spot where colors A, C and D touch each other. Pull up a loop of color C and use it for working an outline of surface crochet slip stitches around the outer edge of the frosting on the cupcake. You’ll be working these sts in the area where colors A and C touch each other.

This is your opportunity to “clean up” the jagged edges and make the cupcake look as appealing as possible. Study the sample carefully; see how I used my surface crochet stitches to outline each portion of the cupcake motif?

Using color D, work a round of surface crochet slip stitches in a circle overtop of the cross stitched area. This makes the cherry motif appear to be round instead of square. End off color D and weave in loose ends.

Insert your hook into a spot where colors A, B and C touch each other. Pull up a loop of color B and work surface crochet slip stitches around the edge of the cupcake, working around the area where colors A and B touch each other.

End off. Weave in the remaining loose ends. Block the potholder if desired.

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